


Mine Eye Hath Play'd the Painter

by Crowgirl



Series: Welcoming Silences [54]
Category: Foyle's War
Genre: Affection, Established Relationship, Fluff, Kissing, Lightly Beta Read, M/M, Non-Chronological, Post-World War II, Public Display of Affection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-07
Updated: 2016-12-07
Packaged: 2018-09-07 00:49:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8776549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crowgirl/pseuds/Crowgirl
Summary: ‘I didn’t know you played.'





	

The hall is nearly empty when Paul walks out from the makeshift backstage. He stands for a minute by the door, wiping his hands dry on the last of the pile of towels that Sam and Marjorie had left for the performers to clean up. There’s a man -- Ted Soames, Paul thinks, guessing from the shirt -- shifting the chairs near the stage, making neat stacks along the front. 

Foyle is sitting on the bench seat in front of the piano, his overcoat folded over the bench beside him. For a minute, Paul thinks he’s just looking at the keyboard but then he takes a step closer and realises Foyle is touching the keys, very gently and too lightly to make a sound. 

Soames stacks the last chair and dusts his hands. Turning, he picks his coat off the edge of the stage and shrugs it on. He stops by the piano and says something to Foyle who nods in response and says something Paul can’t hear, at the same time pressing down a single piano key. The note resonates in the quiet hall: slightly tinny, a little thin. 

Soames walks towards Paul, buttoning his coat. ‘Goodnight, sir -- nice job you did this evening.’

Paul resists the urge to wince. ‘Thanks.’ Being in the school concert is not going to go on his list of top ten accomplishments; he sincerely hopes that everyone would forget it as quickly as possible.

‘Nice to see Mr. Foyle back,’ Soames says, glancing back over his shoulder. ‘Haven’t heard him play in a long time.’ He doesn’t wait for Paul to say anything, just says goodnight and vanishes through the door.

Paul murmurs ‘goodnight’ after him and balls up the towel, dropping it in the rubbish can and checking automatically before he steps away to make sure there aren’t any cigarette ends that could light the cloth. He walks across the hall to the piano; Foyle hasn’t touched another key and all Paul can hear is his own shoes on the scuffed wooden floor. He can smell chalk, wet wool and wood, rust, stale cigarette smoke; the piano sits near the wall and under the row of high windows and the room gets perceptibly cooler the closer he gets. It's something of a relief, really; the hall had been crowded and Paul feels like he's been breathing used air all evening.

‘I didn’t know you played,’ Paul says, sliding onto the other end of the bench. 

Foyle shrugs, dragging his fingers over the keys too lightly to depress any of them. ‘Not for many years.’

‘You didn’t have to come down for this.’

Foyle glances at him sideways, smiling. ‘Sam would never have forgiven me.’

This time, Paul lets himself wince. ‘I should never have let her talk me into it.’

Foyle chuckles and places his hands carefully on the keyboard, miming the motions of a scale. ‘You did a marvellous job.’

‘I haven’t been on a stage since I was at school,’ Paul says, glancing up at the dimmed platform. ‘And there are good reasons for that.’

This time Foyle laughs. ‘You’re being too hard on yourself.’ He presses down the keys slowly, letting the chord sound out to full volume. It rings through the empty hall, echoing off the back wall of the stage. ‘The children loved it.’

‘And Sam’s under strict bond to let me alone for two years.’ 

‘By which time Marjorie Pritchard will have moved on, Sam won’t know the new teacher, and you’ll never be asked again,’ Foyle says, over the notes of the second chord. 

Paul nods. ‘That’s the hope.’ He watches Foyle move his hands slowly over the keyboard, picking out a scale. 

‘That’s a shame.’ Foyle sets his fingers to another chord and glances sideways at Paul, smiling again. ‘I think you have untapped dramatic talent.’

Paul snorts but says nothing, watching Foyle test chords up and down the keyboard and, finally, try the first tentative notes of a tune. Foyle’s hands are as neat over piano keys as they are anywhere else and he picks up speed very slowly until he’s nearly playing at time. Paul doesn’t recognize the tune but he does know when Foyle strikes a collection of sour notes in succession and gives up, dropping his hands in his lap in disgust. ‘And you can see why I gave up playing.’ 

‘What? No, why?’

‘No time to be good at it.’ Foyle runs his thumb over the wooden lip below the keys thoughtfully, then closes the keyboard cover firmly, and turns to Paul. ‘Isn’t there some sort of post-performance celebration you’re due at?’

Paul laughs. ‘I think you’re getting us confused with the Theatre Royal.’ He glances over Foyle’s shoulder to reassure himself that the room is empty and reaches out to take Foyle’s hand, running his thumb along the crease between palm and wrist. He feels the brush, almost sharp, of Foyle’s shirt cuff against his skin and knows that if he presses his fingers further under the cloth, he will find slightly rough hair pressed flat by the shirt.

Foyle watches him for a moment, then raises an eyebrow. ‘Yes?’

Paul shakes his head, moving so he’s cupping Foyle’s hand in both his own, interlacing their fingers from underneath, Foyle’s cool skin warming against his own palm. There’s an old inkstain on Foyle’s index finger, a faded splotch of blue over the callus where he braces his pen; one of his thumbnails has broken off short and Paul can see the faint shadow of an old scar, white across the mound of his thumb. 

‘Paul? What are you thinking about?’ 

‘Your hands,’ Paul answers before he means to and feels himself flush; he looks up at Foyle and meets amused blue eyes.

‘Well, then.’ Foyle manages to stand up without untangling their hands and stretches to get his hat off the piano lid. ‘Since you’ve no pressing engagement with your public--’

Paul chuckles, letting himself be pulled to his feet and around the end of the piano bench. To his surprise, Foyle pulls him in firmly so they’re toe to toe and kisses him. It’s too brief, and Foyle pulls away to comment, almost offhandedly, ‘I don’t get to do that often enough any more.’ He pauses, watching Paul’s face, and smiles, a small, affectionate expression that has more to do with his eyes than his lips and never fails to make Paul want to kiss him. ‘In any case, if you’re so keen on them -- I think my hands should take you home.’

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my darling betas, [elizajane](http://archiveofourown.org/users/elizajane) and [Kivrin](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Kivrin).
> 
> The title is probably a bit -- er -- much but, really, [how could I resist?](http://www.bartleby.com/70/50024.html)


End file.
